Kenneth
JandaPolitical Parties: A Cross-National SurveyNew York: The Free
Press, 1980: pp. 397-398PORTUGAL: The Party System in 1950-1956 and
1957-19621

(Text
as published in 1980 citation above)

A revolution in 1910 deposed the monarchy
in Portugal and replaced it with a republican government. A
period of instability followed, which led to the end of the
republic on May 25, 1926 by a military dictatorship. General
Oscar Carmona, the head of the military junta, became
president in 1928 (reelected in 1935, 1942, and 1949), but
the real political power during his presidency lay in the
hands of Antônio de Oliveira Salazar, a former
university professor named finance minister in 1928 who
became prime minister in 1932. A constitution adopted in
1933 gave form to his regime and established Portugal as a
corporative republic, vesting legislative power in a
"popularly elected" Legislative Assembly and a Corporative
Chamber that in theory represented economic, administrative,
moral, and cultural associations, although only the economic
ones were ever formally established.

The Portuguese National Union or
União Nacional was founded in 1930 to facilitate the
transition between the military dictatorship and the
emerging corporative republic. It specifically described
itself as a nonparty organization, but it functioned like a
party in mobilizing popular support for government policies
through propaganda and cooptation of elites within its
activities. The National Union was largely Salazar's
creation, and he was president of its Central Committee
throughout our time period. While the Communist and other
parties were banned, small opposition alliances were
partially tolerated during one month periods prior to
elections, although they were usually harassed and pressured
to withdraw their candidates. President Carmona was faced
with an opposition candidate in the 1949 election in the
form of General Norton de Matos, but Matos withdrew in
protest just before the election. Following Carmon's death,
the National Union candidate General Francisco Craveiro
Lopes was opposed in 1951 by Admiral Quintao Meireles, who
also withdrew in protest before the election. In the 1958
election, the official candidate, Admiral Americo
Tomáz, was confronted by General Humberto Delgado,
who stayed in the race and won 23 percent of the vote.
Because of Delgado's challenge, the constitution was revised
in 1959 to elect the president by an electoral college
instead of by direct suffrage, thus reducing further the
opportunity for legitimate organized opposition to the
government and the regime.

Continuity
and Change since 1962

Portugal is
one of the few countries in our study that experienced a
complete change in its party system after 1962.Its
instability score is not only the highest for Western
countries but is one of the highest in the study. Following
the military coup in 1974, which dissolved the governing
party, four new parties arose to win more than 5 percent of
the seats in the 1975 and 1976 elections.

Original
Parties, Terminated

171
National Union. This was the governing party of
the Salazar regime. Following Salazar's death in 1968, the
party's name was changed to the Popular National Action
(ANP) in 1970 but continued to hold all seats in the
Assembly. The party terminated in 1974 with the military
coup, which also dissolved the Assembly until elections were
held in 1975 for a constituent assembly to draw up a new
constitution.

New
Parties, Continuing

172
Socialist Party. The Socialist Party (PSP) was formed
in 1973 and was led by Mário Soares, who became the
first prime minister under the new constitution in 1976.

173 Social Democratic. Formed in
1974 as the Popular Democratic Party (PPD), its name was
changed in 1976. The Social Democrats, who were somewhat to
the right of the Socialists, were second only to the
Socialists in size in parliament under the new
constitution.

174 Communist Party. Originally
founded in 1921, the Communist Party had been banned by the
government as early as 1926 but continued a clandestine
existence. It was fourth in parliamentary size after the
1976 elections.

175 Social Democratic Center.
Formed in 1974, the Social Democratic Center (CDS) is
affiliated with the European Union of Christian Democrats
(Europa Yearbook, 1978, p. 1064) and is right of center.

Summary

For nearly 50
years, Portugal had an authoritarian government operating
under a single-party system. The coup in 1974 ended that
regime, and the military prepared for a quick change to
multiparty politics by providing for free elections in 1975
to frame a new constitution and again in 1976 to elect a
legislature. Our four new parties together captured no less
than 85 percent of the vote in each election, but no party
emerged with a . majority of seats. It is perhaps too much
to expect that multiparty politics would operate smoothly in
a nation lacking experience with competitive parties, and
Portugal soon slid into a situation of government
instability, shifting from a minority Socialist government
under Mário Soares to a Soares government supported
by a, shaky coalition of Social Democrats and independents,
and after July 1978 to a right-centrist government with
Soares. As of early 1979, Portugal's multiparty system was
still in a delicate condition.

[For party politics in Portugal since 1962,
go to the essay by Michael
J. Faber]

1. Our study of party politics in
Portugal is based on a file of 725 pages from 71
documents, of which two are in Spanish, the rest English.
A sum of 460 pages in our total file deal specifically
with the National Union (code 171) constituting 63
percent of the pages in the file. The bibliographic
search and indexing of material for the file was done by
Jarol Manheim, who also coded the National Union on the
variables in the ICPP conceptual framework. Ronald
Chilcote was our outside consultant.